Straub Collaborative

Straub Collaborative is a creative studio with locations around the world. They provide photography, videography, CGI+Photogrammetry and more to some of the world’s leading shoe/apparel companies. Founded in 1999, they have experienced immense success and growth over the years. As they prepare to onboard new clients and continue lead generation, the team identified the need for a brand toolkit. As we pin-pointed specific needs, we encouraged them to consider a larger refresh as the original brand hinged on the logo alone. Through collaboration, we created a custom plan for transitioning the team to their new brand.

My Role

Creative Direction + Lead Designer

For this project I collaborated with a copywriter and another graphic designer to help Straub refine their presence. I created concepts for each project that we worked on with Straub and led their team of executives/directors through our creative process for each. I assisted my partner in project management and vendor communications.

Rebrand Process

01 Stakeholder Interviews

Prior to diving into a brand audit and competitor analysis, my partner and I spent 1-2 hours with 13 company stakeholders. We were able to dig deep into their perspectives on the brand, the way their audience experiences Straub’s brand and identifying tools that would help them carry-out their mission.

02 Brand Audit

After collecting input from the team, we analyzed the Straub brand from the perspective of the audience and of course, as designers. We took notes on the internal and client-facing materials as well as notes on their biggest competitors. This audit was then presented to the leadership team.

03 Brand Foundation

Starting with logo, color and typographic development, we focused on transitioning Straub into a new phase of business. Our focus was maintaining the brand equity that they have already established.

04 Toolkit Creation

Based on feedback collected from the stakeholder interviews, we established a list of assets needed in their brand toolkit. The majority of these assets are templates for the team to use in decks and pitches. Our focus was to create user-friendly templates for those without a design background while maintaining brand integrity.

05 Brand Guidelines

The key to a successful rebrand is in the ability for a client to utilize their new tools confidently. The brand guidelines that we created for Straub insure that their team and future design teams will have the tools to present a cohesive brand story to the world.

06 Roll-Out

The roll-out process for this rebrand has been the guiding light since the beginning. Explaining the decisions that we’ve made and how to use the assets is important in building confidence in the team.

Logo Evolution

The original Straub Collaborative logo had functionality issues - scalability, difficulty in printing, too many variations, and type inconsistencies. The logo was the hero of the Straub brand so we decided to evolve the logo instead of fully redesigning it. We established other avenues for presenting the studio locations - this also allows for Straub to continue opening studios without needing to re-address the logo in the future. We made the shift towards title-case as this better aligns with their level of care and professionalism. After we made adjustments to the primary logo, we created a logomark that accommodates small logo placement needs.

Connection

  • Growth through innovation and authentic relationships

  • Visually convey transitions of slides, progress, calls to action, + more

Collaboration

  • Adapting and creating partnership through everything we do

  • Visually convey collaboration, replacing the ampersand in text, technicality, + more

Precision

  • Precision and expertise leading the way forward

  • Displaying information, details

Presentation Design

The core of the Straub Collaborative brand toolkit are the templated assets that we created. The team needed templates built in PowerPoint, Word and Excel. Below are some examples of the templated layouts that were included in the various PowerPoint files that we created.

Workshop Branding

  • Straub Collaborative is one of three studios that make-up a team of content creators who work with one of the leading athletic shoe/apparel companies in the world. Twice a year, they travel to one location for a large workshop/summit where they plan for the coming season. Straub hosted the FW2023 workshop in the summer of 2022. Aside from technical planning, they wanted to establish a theme of sustainability and inclusion. In preparation for this, we partnered with Straub to brand the workshop. Focusing on the theme, I created a graphic that represents each studio’s home city, nature, and connection. We carried out this design across various pieces of collateral such as tumblers, inserts, tote bags, pouches, keychains, coasters, notebooks, presentations and signage. My team handled the vendor communication/production of the printed swag.

  • After receiving such positive feedback from the FW2023 workshop, Straub was asked to host the SS24 workshop in winter of 2023. We partnered with them again to brand this workshop. We offered 3 concepts with differing approaches and their team chose their favorite design. This design is a continuation of the sustainability theme from the FW2023 workshop. We adapted the illustration style to express more natural turns and connections while maintaining the hidden gem aspect of the first design. My team handled the vendor communication/production of the printed swag.

FW23 Summit


SS24 Workshop

New Years Graphics

Every year Straub sends their clients and partners a New Year email to celebrate their accomplishments and to get excited for the year to come. I created custom type treatments for the 2022 and 2023 New Year email.

Plans for website redesign in the future

As Straub rolls out their new brand internally, they are also planning for a greater website redesign in the near future. Check back soon!